He remained six months in Barcelona and there continued his usual mode of life. His wife Lorenza was young, of medium height and fair complexion, with a round face, beautiful eyes and a sweet and languishing expression which proved very attractive. She was a most valuable assistant to him in many ways and he had no scruple, as we have said, in availing himself of her services. From Barcelona he journeyed to Madrid, then on to Lisbon and through France to London. In 1780 he was at Strasburg, where the credulous Germans treated him as a supernatural being, and after visiting many other towns in Germany, he appeared once more in Palermo and Naples, representing himself in every city where he stopped as a famous alchemist and magician who could invoke spirits, revive vanished youth and strength and foretell future events. He also professed to have discovered the secret of the philosopher’s stone and to hold the recipe of the much coveted elixir of life, to sell strange aromatic wines which excited the jaded senses, and finally, to be able to turn mercury into gold and to make precious stones increase in size. It was during the time of his residence in London that his fame became world-wide. One of his first acts there was to enroll himself among the Freemasons, and he very speedily attained to the highest rank in the order. Then he abandoned his paternal name of Balsamo and blossomed out as Alessandro, Count of Cagliostro, a nobleman of vast wealth which he displayed travelling in the greatest pomp and state and surrounded by many servants in splendid liveries. He also gave himself out to be immortal and of an age not to be computed by years, for he possessed the secret of perpetual youth. He kept up this farce for two years in England and then ventured to return to Palermo, where his ancient enemy, Marano, at once caused him to be arrested, and proceedings were taken against him on account of the will he had previously forged. It seems almost incredible, but it is a fact that he was released from prison owing to the intervention of a powerful aristocrat who lived in Naples and to whom he had letters of introduction.